When A Light Goes Out
by Idrelle Miocovani
Summary: Indess Tabris has refused Morrigan's dark ritual. But now the decision is made, how does she tell Zevran that she is willingly going to her death? [A gift for @louminx (Indess belongs to her).]


A/N: This was written as a gift for louminx over on tumblr. Indess belongs to her. If you can, I highly recommend checking out her artwork, it is gorgeous!

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 **When A Light Goes Out**

A fire blazes in the hearth, the light of its dancing flames casting a warm glow across the spacious chamber. It is well into the evening now. Despite the night cold, the window is open, its shutters flung back, inviting in the moon. A sliver of moonlight falls across the floor, stark and cold, a reminder of the world beyond. A world on the edge. A world waiting with bated breath—either to be saved or to fall.

Indess sits on the edge of her bed, twisting a strand of blonde hair between her fingers. She stares ahead, her eyes lingering on the patterns of light across her floor. Gold and silver. Fire and ice. Day and night. It is all she can think of now. Her mind sees everything in binary.

Life and death.

A choice.

"So…"

Zevran's voice is so soft she barely hears it. That is all he is right now—a voice. He stands in her peripheral vision, leaning against the mantelpiece, back to her. She can't bring herself to look at him. Not properly. Not yet.

"This is what Morrigan told you," he continues. "That a Grey Warden's fate in this war is avoidable… at a price."

"There is always a price." Her eyes flash, steel in her gaze. "The nature of it can change, but there will _always_ be a price."

"You don't need to tell me that, I know it too well." He pauses, his silence swallowed by the crackling flames in the hearth. "But why must it be _this?"_

Indess' hands fall into her lap, clasping them together tightly. They are as immovable as she is. "I made my choice."

"Choices can be changed—"

"Not this one."

She raises her chin, only to find him staring back at her. He cast a look over his shoulder, eyes narrowed, the angles of his face sharp and dangerous in the flickering firelight. One hand grips the mantlepiece so hard she can almost see the muscles straining, his knuckles turning white. It is as if he is desperately clinging to the only thing that can keep him here.

"Why?" he says, his voice dark and low. "You've changed your mind before. Why not again?"

"Because it is a decision I will have to live with."

"It is a decision you will _die_ with. Have you realized that?"

"Yes." Indess closes her eyes. She exhales, letting warm breath pass her lips in a whisper of air. "Yes, I have."

Zevran hisses. He lets go of the mantlepiece and runs a hand through his golden hair. "Is it because of magic?" he says, pacing back and forth. "This… dark ritual, or however she named it… Do you distrust Morrigan so much that you believe her ritual would cause future ill?"

"This has nothing to do with magic."

"Then return to her!" Zevran shouts, whirling around and pointing at the door. "Return to her and tell her that you've decided otherwise—"

"I can't. She's gone."

"Then go after her."

"And do what? Drag Alistair along in tow? Keep him in the dark so he can't protest until the very moment I hand him over to her?" A bitter taste fills her mouth. "I could never do that to him."

"Then _I_ will go."

Zevran halts in the middle of the room, facing her, his back to the hearth. For a moment he is outlined in warm light and he looks strangely ethereal. Though he is angry, she knows it is not directed at her, but rather the impossibility of the situation. Beneath the wounded expression, she can see the light of his love for her.

 _Oh, Zevran. Still fighting when the odds are stacked against us. If you were anyone else, you would think I had never cared for you at all._ Indess swallows the lump in her throat and presses her hands together even tighter. Her fingernails dig into her skin. _What did I do to deserve you?_

"Don't go," she says.

"You would stop me?" he retorts. "Even if it is to save your life from your own foolishness?"

Somehow, it's the word _foolishness_ that strikes her. She has made reckless decisions, yes, but a fool? Never.

"Don't talk to me about foolishness, Zevran," Indess snaps, nearly rising from the edge of the bed. "You're the one who accepted a contract with the intent of it ending in your death."

"And it did not," he says. "It led to something unimaginably different. A life. With you." He laughs, the sound harsh and marred. "And now you come to me and _sit_ there, as still as a statue, as you tell me that though there is a way to defeat the archdemon without your inevitable death, you will not do it." He shakes his head, stepping away from her. "How appropriate it is that as soon as I find my reason to live, you find a reason to die. I have found there's a balance in this world—no matter how hard you try to upset it, it always finds a way back to where it started."

Indess looks away. "Zevran, please, don't make this harder than it is—"

He slams a hand against the mantlepiece. "I am trying to save your life. I will make it as hard as I have to because I am a selfish bastard who does not wish to lose you forever."

Indess stands. There is tightness in her throat, a sharp prickle of unfallen tears in her eyes. She crosses the room, each step feeling like she is walking through a quagmire. She fights to keep her expression controlled, praying that she won't break under Zevran's gaze. When she reaches him, she places a hand on his shoulder, her fingers digging into the dark soft of his overcoat. Her other hand seeks out his face, brushing loose hair off his forehead before resting on his cheek. The fire is warm and so, so _alive_ —she feels its flames, its heat on her skin.

And she feels alive.

She kisses him, her lips pressing against his, soft and warm and familiar. He lets out a small sound and lets go of the mantlepiece. She feels his hands on her back, strong fingers gripping the thin fabric of her tunic as he crushes her to him. He kisses her fiercely as she wraps her hands around his neck, fingers threaded through his hair and allows herself to be swept away. They are desperate for each other's touch, desperate to hold onto some semblance of the normality they had so painstakingly carved out together.

Indess pulls away, burying her face against his neck. She breathes in his scent and her embrace tightens. "I don't want to die, Zevran," she murmurs. "But if it's a choice between my death and the death of thousands, I will give it willingly."

"There doesn't need to be a choice," he says, voice nearly breaking.

"Yes, there does," she replies, drawing away. Her eyes find his—she needs him to look at her when she says it. She needs him to understand. "I have never had a choice. Not in the alienage, not with the Wardens. I've been used, I've been broken. Morrigan is just one more person playing their game, pulling my strings like a doll at a puppet show. If I'm going to stop this Blight, I'm going to do it on my terms and my terms alone."

The silence in the room is palpable, thick with the weight of her words. Indess stares at Zevran, waiting for his inevitable reply, his insistence that she disregard her decision, that she find Morrigan and say she was mistaken about the ritual, but he doesn't say a word. He looks at her, eyes flickering over her, taking her in as if for the last time. He threads his fingers through her hair, curling a lock around one finger and slowly letting it go. He places a hand on her shoulder, running it down her arm until his hand finds hers. He holds it, fingers grasping hers, and he rests his forehead against hers.

"Then so it must be," he says.

Zevran kisses her forehead and draws away, smiling gently as he runs a thumb under her eye.

"You're crying, my love," he says gravely.

Indess didn't know when her tears began to fall. "That happens sometimes."

He laughs and pulls her close. "I suppose it's too late to suggest we run away together, hm?" he says, hands encircling her once more.

"Yes," Indess murmurs, resting her head against his shoulder. "Far too late."

"Perhaps I should have said something sooner." He kisses her cheek and sighs, his breath tickling her skin. "On the bright side, you are saving yourself an embarrassing conversation with Alistair."

Indess rolls her eyes. "Zevran, are you really trying to spin this optimistically?"

"I am very adept at spinning poor situations optimistically," he says. "As you well know. It is part of my charming personality."

"Oh, really?"

"If you prefer, think of it this way: I certainly wouldn't want to place the fate of my life in Alistair's ability to seduce Morrigan."

She bites back a chuckle, but she can't quite hide her laugh.

"There, see?" Zevran says. "It doesn't all have to be darkness and doom." He pauses, his smile fading. "I want you to know that whatever happens in Denerim," he continues gravely, "I will stand by your side. And I will hope against hope that the scholars and mages and wardens are wrong, that defeating this beast will not be the end of you."

 _But it will be._

She cannot argue with him, not now, not in this moment. So instead, she nods and falls into his embrace. Zevran holds her for some time and they fall into a silence broken only by the crackle of dying flames and the twin beat of their hearts. Indess tries not to think of what she has resigned herself to, of what she has chosen to give up. Memories whirl through her mind, thoughts and images of time past—her family, Ostagar, the climb to the Urn of Sacred Ashes, and Zevran, always Zevran. She tries to blot them out, but she can't stop them. She clutches at him, wanting to scream at the unfairness of it all—that she should gain so much, only to lose it all because it was the only course of action she could take.

But she doesn't scream. She doesn't cry. Instead, she kisses him and murmurs a single phrase against his lips.

"My one regret in all of this," Indess says, "is losing you."

Zevran nods and kisses her cheek. "I know."

There are only embers left in the hearth now.


End file.
